


It Only Takes A Second

by Nishani_Haripersadh



Category: One-shot - Fandom, Short-story
Genre: Falling In Love, Gen, Obsession, Physical Abuse, Requited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-19
Updated: 2013-08-19
Packaged: 2017-12-24 00:41:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,808
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/933092
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nishani_Haripersadh/pseuds/Nishani_Haripersadh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When that mysterious inner voice speaks to you - that "gut feeling" or "instinct" - listen to it! It often turns out to be right.</p>
            </blockquote>





	It Only Takes A Second

She felt her hackles rising, the hair on the back on her neck stood on end as she tightened her coat more securely across her chest. She shoved her gloved fists into the pockets of her trench coat and trying to rid the feeling of unease that ensconced her, she shook her head vigorously from side to side.

_Stop it, Joelle! It's all in your mind,_ she chided herself. _He is not here to bother you anymore. He can't hurt you any longer. Even though... No! Enough with the negative thoughts!_

Joelle shuddered as copious amounts of nausea bubbled up within her. She inhaled calm and deep breaths.

_He's not here! He can't hurt me anymore!_

Just a block to go. _Calm down!_ Ten more steps. Five to go.

She tried to insert the key into the keyhole just as her fingers suddenly felt numb and useless. She watched in horror as they cascaded to the wet cemented ground.

_Damn!_

Joelle hastily bent down as she looked over her shoulder. It was eerily quiet. Too quiet for a late Friday evening. The silence seemed foreboding. Unearthly. She stood upright and jammed the key into the lock for the second time.

_Yes!_

She raced up the stairs to her apartment on the third floor.

_Please be home! Please lord, let him be home!_

"Caleb," she called out shrilly to the open expanse of the lounge. She closed the door behind her and shut her eyes as the secureness of her small apartment she shared with her boyfriend warmly shrouded her. "Caleb, are you home?"

Her ever dependable and shaggy-haired boyfriend peeped from around the entryway leading to the kitchen as their cat, Socrates, jaunted gingerly up to her.

"I'm here, my beauty." Caleb's goofy grin was wiped off his face when he noticed the look of disquiet on his girlfriend's. "Joelle," he hurried to her. "What's wrong, babe?"

"He's here, Caleb." Tears blurred her vision. "I know he is."

"That can't be, baby. He's locked up."

"Please Caleb," Joelle shook her head vehemently. "I am not seeing things nor am I making it up. You have to believe me!"

"I believe you, honey."

He chewed on his lip, deliberating, and Joelle could see the mechanics begin to turn in his brilliant mind. How she loved him. She never thought she'd ever be with someone again after all she had been through with Adam. Yet here she was, with her beloved geek who taught her to love and trust again.

"When's he due to be released, Joels," Caleb asked as he enveloped her in his comforting embrace.

"His two y-years will be up next week." Her soft grey eyes widened in alarm. "Caleb, you don't think he's already been rel-"

"Shhh baby," he cooed softly in her ear. "Why don't you take a hot shower? Relax a bit and when you're done, I'll have dinner on the table." He grinned cheekily at her, trying to allay her anxiety. "I got home early and I've made your favourite."

Joelle was so grateful for a man like Caleb. Sure, he wasn't most girls' cups of tea. He was a nerdy scientist who wore short-sleeved shirts unbuttoned over long-sleeved tees with baggy jeans and Levi's canvas sneakers and geeky glasses. But he was unique and he was hers. In mind, spirit and heart. Yet she always felt like she burdened him with all her emotional baggage even though he never once complained while welcoming her into his life with open arms.

"I love you, Cale." She ran her fingers over his stubbled jaw. "I love you so much."

"Ditto honey. Now scoot to the bathroom before I take you right here on this couch and forgo all thoughts of a yummy dinner."

 

Joelle stripped out of her veterinary technician's uniform and cringed in revulsion as she espied herself in the full-length mirror. Her disfigurement always brought a sense of shame and horror to her eyes and her self-esteem took a knock everytime she saw herself naked. She turned away quickly and walked into the shower cubicle.

As she lathered her hair with shampoo, Joelle thought back to her very first encounter with Adam. He had been her first boyfriend, her first lover, her first everything. It had taken her just a second to fall for his charismatic charm and it literally took the same amount of time for him to turn from a courteous gentleman into a green-eyed monster.

Two months into their relationship, her personal hell began. His abuse - mental, verbal and physical - was more than she could handle and when it resulted in her being admitted to hospital with a nervous breakdown, Adam swore that he'd change and strive to be a better person for them both. She had been a fool and being a fool in love, she took his word as gospel and chose to see the good in him. How wrong she was!

For two weeks thereafter, life had been great until one afternoon, Adam had decided to surprise her by picking her up when her shift ended at the animal hospital. He had found her chatting to a gentleman who had brought in a stray cat for a check-up. That very gentleman had been Caleb Landry. The very Caleb who she now shared an apartment with, with the aforementioned stray; the Siamese cat, Socrates a.k.a. Socks.

That very night Joelle had been beaten black and blue and when she was rendered almost comatose by Adam's fists, he had panicked. He drove her to the hospital where he had lied to the E.R. nurse that she had fallen down a flight of stairs. Joelle had to spend three days in hospital nursing bruised ribs and a concussion and a further three days recuperating at home.

 

Joelle hurtled back to reality when she heard Caleb call out to her from behind the locked bathroom door.

"Are you okay in there, honey?"

"Yes!"

"Sweet, babe! Dinner is almost ready."

Joelle had to smile at her loving and adorable Caleb with his witty sense of humour, his extraordinarily intelligent mind and his pure and generous heart. Those were the very reasons why she gave herself a second chance with her own heart. They had clicked immediately on that afternoon when he had brought Socrates in for a check-up. Though on that day, he was just an average guy concerned about a stray he had found and she was just a lowly aide studying to become a Vet Tech.

 

When Joelle had returned to work following her altercation with Adam – after he'd seen her with Caleb – he made sure he fetched her every evening when her shift ended at the animal hospital.

Two weeks later, Caleb walked into her life again. This time it wasn't for Socrates who was thriving after he had adopted the cat. He'd come to see her just to say hi. The notion that he had come to see her specifically, coupled with the fact that Adam was due to pick her up at any given moment, sent a wave of apprehension cascading through her.

"Please Mr Landry, I really think you should leave. Like right now!"

"Why?" A lopsided grin curved his sensual pink lips upwards.

_Too late!_

Joelle felt her BP skyrocket. Adam's green eyes sparked lethally when he walked in and found her talking to Caleb.

"A-Adam," her voice trembled shrilly. "Just g-give me a few minutes."

Adam didn't respond yet he continued to glare glassy-eyed from Joelle to Caleb and back again. She grabbed her handbag from her locker, said her goodbyes to the two other daytime staff members and then followed Adam out the door without even a backward glance at Caleb. He stood at the front desk, gobsmacked and when he finally got his bearings together, he made to follow Joelle and her companion.

"I rather you didn't."

A voice stopped Caleb in his tracks and he pirouetted on the spot to see who had spoken to him. It was a matronly woman with kindness etched upon her face.

"Leave them be, my boy. Their relationship is..." She didn't seem to know how to continue. "Very complicated to say the least."

The next instant Caleb heard a rip-curling scream and before his mind could process what was happening, he found his feet carrying him out the door.

There sprawled on the cold and damp asphalt was the girl, who for the last two weeks he couldn't get off his mind, lying bloody and twitching while her boyfriend stood over her, looking maniacal and holding a jagged and broken bottle in his hand.

"Come any closer," Adam threatened harshly. "And I will finish her off. If I cannot have her, nobody else will either. Got that!"

"Please dude," Caleb beseeched, staring up into the glacial eyes of the tall man a few feet away from him. "Don't hurt her anymore than you already have or you're going to find yourself in very serious trouble."

Joelle moved a fraction on the hard tarmac, hardly daring to breathe because of the excruciating pain that wracked every inch of her body. She knew she was on the very precipice of passing out as the wetness of her very own blood seeped across her tummy. She squeezed her eyes shut as shock gave way to a feeling of disconsolate helplessness while the tinny smell of blood wafted up her nose. She soon heard the sound of sirens blaring in the distance, coming ever nearer just as she took a ragged breath while a welcoming darkness blanketed her.

Joelle fluttered her eyes open and found that she was in a hospital bed surrounded by warm soft sheets while glorious sunshine baked her cheeks and peaceful silence engulfed her. She turned her aching head slightly to her left and saw the young man who had come to the vet clinic to see her – Caleb – asleep in a most uncomfortable position on a wooden chair. She tried to open her mouth but it seemed to be glued shut as realisation of what had transpired the previous night hit her full force. A trickle of tears ran down her face as a soft sob escaped her.

_When is this nightmare ever going to end?_

"Joelle?"

She turned her face a notch toward the sweet and soothing voice.

"How are you feeling?"

She shook her head slightly and pointed to the carafe on the bedside table. Caleb leapt to his feet and poured her a glass of water, assisting her to sip a little through a straw while he stroked her silky hair tenderly with his other hand.

"T-thank you," she rasped, finally able to speak.

"I am so sorry about yesterday," Caleb said hurriedly as the words tumbled out of his mouth. "It's all my fault."

"No, don't..." Joelle croaked hoarsely, wincing in pain. "Blame yourself."

"I must, Joelle. If I didn't decide to pay you an unexpected visit, this would never have happened. Now I must live with the fact that the girl..." He paused as a blush stained his cheeks. "That the girl I _really_ like is in a hospital bed nursing a serious injury because of me."

Joelle gasped. _He likes me!_

"I'm so sorry, honey." Caleb stuck his hands into his jeans pockets. "I never meant for this to hap–"

A surgeon walked in and interrupted their moment.

"Good day, Miss Thomas. Aren't you a lucky lady?"

"Is she going to be alright, doctor?"

"Yes son. As I said, she's a lucky lady. You very nearly had your spleen ruptured, missy," the doctor stated as he turned his attention back to Joelle. "But I'm so pleased to say that with the right care, you'll be up and about in no time." He frowned a moment later. "Though..."

"Though what," Caleb interjected, shuffling his feet anxiously.

"There will be scarring from the injury. Your boyfriend penetrated your abdomen with a broken bottle but on a good note, I have managed to remove all the shrapnel. The pain will no doubt linger, Joelle. Medication will help to a degree so it is also up to you to look after yourself as best as possible once you're discharged."

_Adam?_ Joelle swallowed hard. _Where is he?_

"You rest now, dear girl," Dr Hammond said soothingly with a kind smile upon his bearded face. "You'll come to no harm here. I'll leave it to your young friend to explain it all to you."

Joelle nodded, then flinched as a sharp pain riveted across her belly.

"What should I know, friend?"

"Your boyfriend," Caleb's pale blue eyes flickered angrily, "has been arrested and charged with grievous bodily harm. My father, erm, is a judge at the county courthouse and he is looking into your case. I hope you do not mind my intervention."

"No, not at all," Joelle replied softly. "If you hadn't been there, I don't know what would have happened to me."

"If I hadn't come to see you, none of this would have happened in the first place."

"Don't blame yourself, Caleb. This was," Joelle bit down on her lip to prevent her tears from spilling over. "Inevitable. If not you, it would have been another reason for Adam to be triggered off. He's just so angry all the time. Everything I do always sets him off."

"Then why are you with him?"

"I'm too scared to leave. You saw him yesterday. You heard what he said. I don't have anyone to turn to, Caleb. I have no family support system. No social life."

"I don't mean to distress you, Joelle. But there are ways and means of walking away from an abusive relationship. I don't even consider him a man knowing what he's done to you. He's a punk!"

"You're right," she sighed in defeat. "But he's broken me. I am so fractured, Caleb. So much so that I don't even know how to put the pieces of myself back together. I don't even think I have the strength to go about it."

Caleb suddenly held out his hand which Joelle tentatively accepted. It was soft and warm and so comforting. The polar opposite of Adam.

"Give me a chance and I promise to try and put those very pieces back together again."

"Why," Joelle cried out.

"Because in front of me I see a beautiful person with a beautiful soul who deserves a beautiful life."

 

Joelle switched off the faucet and grabbed a towel from the wooden rack. Two years had passed since Caleb had extended his hand to her and true to his promise, he held her hand every day since then, nursing her to health, helping her get her fragile self-esteem back into shape and telling her at every available opportunity how special and beautiful she was.

Caleb had even bought her, her very own star for her twenty-fourth birthday just two weeks prior. He was, after all, an astrophysicist whose head was always up in the heavens. He was her very own personal heaven. Her very own shining star. Her beacon of strength and light in her otherwise darkened world.

"Baby?"

"I'm almost done, Cale," she called out to him. "Two minutes, tops."

Joelle wrapped her fleecy nightgown over her now steaming body and stepped out into the passageway of the new apartment she moved into with Caleb a month ago. It was their home now which they shared with Socks and she loved the comfort and security it brought her. She loved the route and routine her life had taken. Caleb, although being a nerdy scientist, was an impassioned lover and a very attentive boyfriend who always put her needs ahead of his own. She considered herself lucky and blessed to have gotten a second chance at love and she smiled to herself when she heard him humming loudly to AC/DC's 'Shoot To Thrill' from the kitchen. He was the epitome of a walking-talking juxtaposition and she adored him for it.

After Joelle slipped into her over-worn PJs, she found Caleb setting the table in their cosy dining room.

"I don't think I'll ever tire of seeing you in your Hello Kitty's, my beautiful."

Joelle blushed. "You are so good to me, Cale."

"As you are to me, baby." Caleb stared at his gorgeous and petite brunette, undisguised love shimmering in his eyes. "Come, let's eat. My mother insists on knowing how her recipe turned out."

"You made my favourite favourite with your mom's recipe?"

"Yeah," he flashed his trademark lopsided grin. "She wanted to prepare it for you herself but I insisted that I wanted to do it."

"Your family is just the best, Cale. I love you all so much."

The Landry family had taken Joelle in and treated her as one of their own from the onset. It was another thing she was so grateful for since she had lost her own family when she was little. She had been shunted from foster care to foster care yet she had made it through and persevered irrespective of how emotionally and physically damaged she was. For the past two years, she had a group of people to thank for that; the Landry's.

"We love you too, honey." Caleb squeezed her hand from across the table. "You know that, right?"

Joelle nodded as she pushed the lasagne around her plate. She became so immersed in her thoughts that she didn't hear Caleb talking to her.

"Babe?"

"Hmm."

She looked up to see his pale blue eyes poring into hers.

"Is it not to your liking?"

"It's not that. I..." She swallowed a sob. "Just have a lot on my mind."

"Come here, baby!"

Joelle promptly jumped up from her seat and walked around the table and perched herself on Caleb's lap. He wrapped his ever dependable arms across her waist and dropped soft kisses to the bare column of her throat.

"He's out there on the streets, Cale. Free and loose to do as he pleases. I can sense it."

"I'll tell you what! I shall call my father later and ask him to find out if Adam has indeed been released and if he is, then maybe he can get a protection order signed quickly for you."

"Can he do that for me?"

"Baby, being an esteemed judge, my father is an upstanding pillar in this community. If he cannot, nobody can."

"Okay then."

"I love you so much, Joelle." He dipped his hand underneath the knit material of her Hello Kitty top and ran the pads of his fingers along the scar tissue on her abdomen. "I'll do anything and everything I can to protect you."

Joelle squeezed her eyes shut as she hid her face in the crook of Caleb's neck. Even though it had been two long years since the stabbing incident, she was still very self-conscious regarding her disfigurement. And although Caleb made love to her almost every night since they had become a couple, she was still ashamed of the scarring.

"I love you despite everything, Joels. To me, you are the most heavenly creature even surpassing the brightest stars in the sky. I am proud to call myself your boyfriend. You must know that, honey."

The deluge of emotions that Joelle had been suppressing for the past hour opened like a sluice. She held onto Caleb for dear life, pressing her body against his solid frame while he clutched her tightly to him.

There was sudden pandemonium outside their door, followed by heavy footfalls, a muffled thud and then several loud screams.

"Wait here, baby!" Caleb set Joelle to her feet. "Don't come outside. Lock the door and do not open it unless I call out for you. I'll be back shortly."

Joelle sat on the couch, her back ramrod straight and tried to strain her ear and listen to the commotion outside. She couldn't discern anything and finally after the longest ten minutes, there was a knock on the door.

"Honey?"

Joelle unlatched the lock and was confronted by Caleb who had a look of utter shock on his face. He quickly ducked into the apartment and collapsed onto the couch.

"Caleb," Joelle felt her nerves jangle frantically to see her usually cool and calm boyfriend shellshocked. "What happened out there?"

"It's," he swallowed hard as his hand flew up to his throat. "Adam."

"What of him?" Joelle fell to her knees in front of Caleb.

'You were right in your assumption, Joels. He's out of prison. Though right now, he is literally out. Stone cold and lying at the foot of the stairs on the second floor. Dead!"

"WHAT?"

"He was coming here, honey. Somehow he'd found out where we lived and he was coming for us." Caleb ran a shaky hand through his dark hair. "He had a knife on him. Mr Elton witnessed what happened.  Adam was bolting up the stairs and somehow he tripped over his shoelaces which had come undone. He fell over backwards in his haste and the knife he, no doubt, wanted to use to threaten us perhaps, impaled him. Oh my gosh, Joels! Mr Elton said he was asking about us earlier today and mentioned he'd never seen a man look so crazed in all his life. He's ah," Caleb shook his head, still stricken with shock. "Called for the police already."

"It's over?" Joelle whispered as she sat back on her haunches. "Is it truly over, Cale?"

"I should somehow be sorry that a man is now dead, Joels. But knowing it's the very man who for eight months tortured and abused you in every way possible, I can honestly say I am not sorry at all."

"What's going to happen now?"

"The police are on their way. It's not a pretty sight babe, but the scene speaks for itself. And obviously the law enforcement agency knows about your history with Adam and there are a few witnesses who have seen what transpired here tonight. It should be cut and dried, honey."

"It's over, Cale." Joelle started to sob hysterically. "We can move on finally. No more living in fear and looking over my shoulder."

"Yes baby," Caleb sighed in relief as he slithered down to the floor and took Joelle into his arms. "We can finally move forward. I love you, my angel."

As Caleb held the love of his life tightly to him, he knew that it took literally only a second for a course of action to be set in motion. It did after all take just a second for him to fall in love with the woman in his arms and as far as he was concerned, that very second would lead him into the rest of his life with her at his side.

**Soundtrack:** "Protection" - Massive Attack


End file.
